Swimming Lessons
Published on 26. January 2017
Book
Hardback
304 pages
978-0-241-25215-4 (ISBN)
Description
The second novel from the author of Our Endless Numbered Days, which won the 2015 Desmond Elliott Prize and was a 2016 Richard and Judy Book Club Pick.
'Thrilling, transporting, delicately realised and held together by a sophisticated sense of suspense ... more than matches the power of Fuller's debut ... Powerful, pleasing and pleasurable.' Sunday Times
'Gil Coleman looked down from the window and saw his dead wife standing on the pavement below.'
Gil's wife, Ingrid, has been missing, presumed drowned, for twelve years.
A possible sighting brings their children, Nan and Flora, home. Together they begin to confront the mystery of their mother. Is Ingrid dead? Or did she leave? And do the letters hidden within Gil's books hold the answer to the truth behind his marriage, a truth hidden from everyone including his own children?
'Thrilling, transporting, delicately realised and held together by a sophisticated sense of suspense ... more than matches the power of Fuller's debut ... Powerful, pleasing and pleasurable.' Sunday Times
'Gil Coleman looked down from the window and saw his dead wife standing on the pavement below.'
Gil's wife, Ingrid, has been missing, presumed drowned, for twelve years.
A possible sighting brings their children, Nan and Flora, home. Together they begin to confront the mystery of their mother. Is Ingrid dead? Or did she leave? And do the letters hidden within Gil's books hold the answer to the truth behind his marriage, a truth hidden from everyone including his own children?
Reviews / Votes
Thrilling, transporting, delicately realised and held together by a sophisticated sense of suspense . . . more than matches the power of Fuller's debut . . . Powerful , pleasing and pleasurable. * Sunday Times * A compelling portrait of a complicated, unconventional marriage, and of flawed humanity, with all its secrets, silences and deceits. Excellent. * Mail on Sunday * It's the sharp eye for detail, sometimes bizarre, that makes her writing stand out . . . A story suffused with the poignancy of miscommunication between people who love each other, of the things we can never really know. * Guardian * Claire Fuller has captured love in its fullest form, nursed on betrayal and regret and guilt . . . Swimming Lessons is so smoothly, beautifully written, and the human failures here are heartbreaking. * David Vann * Bewitching and page-turning . . . an extraordinarily smart and satisfying read. * Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife * With Swimming Lessons, Fuller confirms herself as a writer of emotional depth, technical skill and sensitive plotting . . . What Fuller evokes beautifully are the complicated dynamics between fathers and daughters, sisters, lovers, friends * Observer * A deeply moving read, with a mystery that keeps you turning pages * Oprah.com * Evocative, immersive * Sarah Vaughan, author of Anatomy of a Scandal * Extraordinary...From the opening sentence it is gripping...Fuller writes with a singing simplicity that finds beauty amid the terror...might well have you crying out for more. * Sunday Times on Our Endless Numbered Days * Bewitching...a rivetingly dark tale...spellbinding. * Sunday Express on Our Endless Numbered Days * Fuller handles the tension masterfully in this grown-up thriller of a fairytale, full of clues, questions and intrigue. * The Times on Our Endless Numbered Days * Fuller's twisted tale is compulsive, treading the fine line between charming and sinister. With its disturbing twist, Our Endless Numbered Days could well become a classic. * Stylist, 'Book Wars' on Our Endless Numbered Days * Rewardingly unsettling...as warped and sinister as any Brothers Grimm fairytale, this tautly written, tense novel is brilliant at evoking both the bewitching beauty of its setting - and its inherent dangers...haunting, suspenseful and deftly written...memorably chilling. * Metro on Our Endless Numbered Days * A debut novel that brings to mind such unlikely bedfellows as Thoreau's Walden and Emma Donoghue's Room...gripping. * Guardian on Our Endless Numbered Days *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Penguin Books Ltd
Dimensions
Height: 222 mm
Width: 144 mm
Thickness: 29 mm
Weight
444 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-241-25215-4 (9780241252154)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Claire Fuller
Swimming Lessons
E-Book
01/2017
1st Edition
Penguin Books Ltd
€8.99
Available for download
Person
Claire Fuller was born in Oxfordshire, England, in 1967. She gained a degree in sculpture from Winchester School of Art, but went on to have a long career in marketing and didn't start writing until she was forty. Her first novel, Our Endless Numbered Days, won the Desmond Elliott Prize. She has an MA in Creative and Critical Writing from the University of Winchester and lives in Hampshire with her husband and two children.